Most of what goes wrong in a backyard flock starts as a question somebody answered with a guess. Is this egg still good? Can they have the leftover avocado? How big does the coop really need to be for eight hens? When will that clutch hatch, and when do I stop turning them? These free tools answer one of those questions each, from your own numbers, in a few seconds. Nothing to sign up for, nothing to install, and they work on a phone in one hand while the other is full of feed scoop.
Checkers & Finders
One thing in your hand — an egg, a scrap, a breed — and a straight answer about it.
- Egg Float Test & Freshness CheckerWhat the float test really measures, and how long your eggs keep — washed or not.
- Can Chickens Eat It? Food CheckerType the scrap in your hand: safe, in moderation, only prepared, or never — and why.
- Chicken Breed Finder & ComparerFilter breeds by what you want, or put any two side by side — with every hatchery’s figure.
- How Cold Is Too Cold for Chickens? Cold & Heat CheckerTonight’s low in, an honest answer out — draughts, frostbite, and whether to heat the coop.
- Chicken Name Generator — Hens, Roosters & Whole FlocksHen or rooster, colour and personality in — twelve names that fit the bird, or a set for the flock.
- Hen or Rooster? Pullet or Cockerel CheckerAge and what you can see in — cockerel, pullet or too early to tell, and how far to trust each sign.
- Duck Name Generator — Ducks, Drakes & Whole FlocksDuck or drake, colour and personality in — twelve names written for ducks, or a set for the flock.
- What’s Wrong With This Egg? Blood Spots, Double Yolks & ShellsA blood spot, two yolks, a pale yolk or a soft shell — is it safe to eat, and why did she lay it?
- Duck Breed Finder — Which Duck for Eggs, Pets or a Small PondEggs, a calm pet, meat or slug patrol — 21 duck breeds in order, with every figure sourced.
- Turkey Name Generator — Hens, Toms & Whole FlocksHen or tom, colour and personality in — twelve names written for turkeys, or a set for the flock.
- Goose Name Generator — Geese, Ganders & Whole GagglesGoose or gander, colour and personality in — twelve names written for geese, or a set for the gaggle.
Flock Calculators
Numbers in, an answer out: coop and run size, how many eggs, when they hatch.
- Chicken Coop, Run & Roost Size CalculatorCoop floor, run, nest boxes and roost length for your flock — three official answers.
- Egg Production CalculatorEggs a week and a year for your flock — and how many hens for a dozen a week.
- Egg Incubation & Hatch Date CalculatorHatch date, candling days, lockdown and the right humidity — for thirteen species.
- When Will My Pullets Start Laying? First Egg CalculatorHatch date and breed in: the weeks her first egg should fall in, and what short days do to it.
- Chicken Feed Calculator: How Much, How Long a Bag LastsFeed a week for your flock, how long the bag lasts, and what a dozen eggs costs you in feed.
- How Many Eggs Will My Ducks Lay? Duck Egg CalculatorBreed and number of ducks in — eggs a year and a week, with and without extra winter light.
Charts & Planners
Reference to keep by the coop door, and plans you can follow week by week.
- How Long Do Chickens Live? Lifespan by Kind of BirdEvery published lifespan for her kind of bird, drawn side by side, with her age marked on it.
- Chicken Molting Planner — When Will She Lay Again?The day the feathers started in — when her eggs come back, by each source’s molt length, and what helps.
- How Long Do Ducks Live? Lifespan by Kind of DuckEvery published lifespan for your kind of duck, side by side — Pekin, Muscovy, light breeds or Calls.
- Duck Eggs vs Chicken Eggs — Size, Nutrition & SwapsUSDA’s figures side by side — per egg or weight for weight — with quail, goose and turkey eggs, and a recipe swap.
- How Long Do Geese Live? Every Published Goose LifespanEvery published lifespan for a domestic goose, side by side, with your goose’s age marked against each.
- Chick Brooder Temperature Chart — Week by Week, From Your Hatch DayHatch day in — this week’s brooder temperature, every week’s after it, and when the heat lamp comes off.
Where the numbers come from
Every figure here is quoted from whoever published it, with the date I last checked it printed next to the answer. Egg safety comes from the USDA and from university extension services that run backyard-flock programmes. Coop space and incubation come from extension publications written by poultry scientists. Breed figures come from the hatcheries that publish them, each one named, because they do not agree. Nothing is invented, and nothing is dressed up to look more precise than it is.
Where the official answers disagree, you see both
This surprised me when I started checking. The USDA says raw eggs keep three to five weeks in the fridge; one extension service says unwashed backyard eggs keep two to three months. Penn State’s coop table allows one and a half square feet per hen indoors; Oregon State says three. Two publications from the same university give opposite advice on incubator humidity at hatch time. Most pages quietly pick one and print it as fact. These tools print both, say who said which, and leave the choice with you — because an average of two official answers is a number nobody actually recommended.
Where a tool stops
I keep chickens; I am not a vet. None of these tools diagnoses a sick bird, and none of them will tell you a dose of anything. If a hen is off her food, fluffed up in a corner, or you think she has eaten something she should not have, ring an avian vet rather than working from a web page — including this one. The tools are for the everyday questions: space, food, eggs, dates.
Share an answer, or keep it
Every result has its own link. Copy link saves exactly what you entered, so you can send a coop plan to whoever is doing the building, or keep your hatch dates on your phone without writing them on the wall of the shed.
Put a tool on your own site
Every tool has an Embed button. It gives you a short piece of code to paste into a page, a club newsletter, a 4-H resources page or a feed store’s website. The tool works there exactly as it does here, free, with a credit line linking back.
More from the site
The tools answer the quick questions. For the longer ones — what a breed is really like to keep, what goes wrong in a first winter, and a couple of hundred answers to “can chickens eat…?” — start with the latest posts.